Snagging & defect report app for iPad – from walkthrough to PDF

Sound familiar?

One site inspection, twenty defects, and the report waiting for you at the office in the evening.

With clipboard and phone camera

On site: crosses on a printed plan, keywords on a notepad.
At the office: going through 80 photos, guessing which belongs to which room.
Typing up notes, dragging photos into a template, numbering, saving as PDF.
The report doesn't go out until the next day.

With Plaans

Every photo sits on the plan where it was taken – with its viewing direction.
Voice notes instead of a notepad. Plaans can convert them to text.
Numbers, dates, photos and comments go into the report automatically.
The report is done by the time you leave the site.

A walkthrough with Plaans

Four steps from the floor plan to the report in your client's inbox.

Photo in Plaans placed on the floor plan with position, viewing direction, date and time

Steps 1 & 2

Load the plan, photograph defects

You bring the floor plan onto the iPad as a PDF, JPG or PNG – via the Files app or over Wi-Fi from your computer. On site, tap your position and the viewing direction, then take the photo.

The photo appears as a viewing cone on the plan, with date and time. Type or dictate a comment right away.

Voice note in Plaans, automatically converted to text

Step 3

Speak instead of writing

When your hands are full, just record the defect. The voice note sits at the right spot on the plan, and Plaans can convert it to text.

You can correct the transcript, and it appears in the report. Assign entries to one of twelve colour layers – one per trade, for example.

Step 4

Export and send the report

One tap on the share icon and Plaans creates, for each layer, a plan with numbered markers and a data sheet with the same numbers, photos, comments and transcripts.

Your logo and address are in the header. Send the report by email or save it to the Files app – straight from the iPad.

What the export contains

Everything in one ZIP file, neatly sorted by project, group and plan.

Numbered plan

One PDF of the plan per layer, with every entry drawn in as a numbered marker. Anyone can find the spot on site again.

Data sheet as report

Project, address and date in the header, then every entry in number order: when it was recorded, photo, comment, transcript. Optionally with the plan preview as cover sheet.

Your company logo

Enter your company name, address, contact person and logo once in the settings. They appear on every report.

Image size to suit

Large photos for details or small ones for more entries per page: you set the image size in the PDF in three steps.

CSV for Excel

Each layer also comes as an Excel-compatible CSV file, for example to transfer defects into a list or process them further.

Interactive plan set

An index.html opens the whole project in the browser: click through plans, view photos, play voice notes. No software to install.

Explained step by step in the tutorial.

Questions from practice

Does it work without a connection, e.g. in a basement?

Yes. Photos, voice notes and the export work completely offline, because everything stays on the iPad. You only need a connection again to send the report by email. More under Your data stays with you.

Can I mark defects as fixed or set deadlines?

Plaans has no dedicated status or deadline workflow. What works well in practice is using the colour layers for it: new defects go on the red layer, and you move fixed ones to the green layer with the layers icon. Since each layer gets its own report, you automatically have a list of open items.

Can I create one report per trade?

Yes, with layers. Each of the twelve colour layers is exported as its own plan PDF with its own data sheet. For example, create one layer for electrical and one for plumbing and name them accordingly.

Can I edit the report in Word?

The report is a finished PDF file. If you want to process the entries further, use the CSV file: it opens in Excel, and the photos are included in the export as individual JPG files.

Does Plaans run on the iPhone too?

Yes, Plaans is available for iPad and iPhone. For walkthroughs with large floor plans we recommend the iPad, since you see more of the plan.

You'll find more answers in our FAQ.

From walkthrough to finished report.